TFA Year One - Recap

No writing occurred for the past three weeks on this blog. This is self-evident. All you have to do is scroll down and see for yourself that the last date posted was May 6th or something.

One of my friends told me the other day that he thought maybe some freak hurricane washed me out to sea and since I was the only fatality of this otherwise innocuous natural disaster, there was no press coverage. What else could explain, he continued, your lack of postings *and* non-existent cell phone?

In truth, there was no natural disaster. I was ruminating. And I my phone stopped working.

I struggled, during this past month, to put this year in prospective. I knew that I would be returning to the Midwest for June, and with that return would come many friends, family and just acquaintances that would call me to give an account of my toil.

And my struggle revolved around a couple of questions:

• How do I explain the impact that I had when all of my hard data shows that I had no real measurable affect on my students? For that matter, *did* I have an impact? What was it?
• How do I explain the reality of schools like mine, where students are driven by the test and not much else? How do I explain the youth addicted to entertainment, with no focus for anything that does not involve BET, a movie or video games?
• How do I explain the administrators and teachers that are on the ground, working for the best for the students, but at the same time, trying to preserve their jobs? How do I explain their decisions?
  
• How do I talk about Teach For America, when I do not see 'solvency' in my classroom, when I see progress yes, but not solvency in my school, when I don't know what solvency even looks like in the broad scheme of things?

I think I struggle with these questions because they are hard questions and deep questions. I want to write that maybe they don't have answers, but as part of this movement, as a member of this movement fighting for educational equality, I *have* to believe that solvency is possible in some form. Maybe I am just not smart enough, experienced enough, creative enough, something enough to think up a solution that could work. I don't know.

The reality of this year though, is that by the numbers, I did not really make an impact. Yes, 7 of my students passed the standardized test, where no one passed last year. But there are quite a few students who passed 2 years ago or 3 years ago, and did not pass this year. In terms of net improvement, I had 50% of my students increase their scores. That means 50% decreased. The actual number of questions increased was also balanced by the number of questions decreased. So statistically, numerically, I am a wash for year one.

Yes, I still had an impact on my students. One of my students wrote me a letter talking about how she did not know how to divide before this year (a 7th grader) and now she does, how she was bored and ignored the teacher and she found herself being interested in fractions (!). This is a real impact. And so many of my students come to spend time in my room before school or during advisory saying "I don't want to go to so and so, they don't like me". Time and again the tough students come to me.

And while this *is* important, I cannot stop looking at the numbers. I cannot stop looking at one student who will come and engage me in conversation and then sit and do literally nothing during all of my class, regardless of my pleadings. If they don't *learn* anything from me, any math...well, did I alter there course? Did I change their life options? Who knows.

Despite these things, I can honestly say that I loved this year. I am returning next year. I recommend Teach For America to anyone and everyone. While I think it is not the end-all-be-all of educational solutions, I am reminded of a quote that TFA espouses, that really struck me by Mahatma Gandhi; "Be the change you want to see in the world."

TFA is *doing* something. I am *doing* something. And the something is not sand in the wind. The something lives and breathes and dreams and fears and grows up and changes the world.

Vacation

I am officially on vacation.

There are many projects going on at my house, but I feel I have no duty or obligation to involve myself with these mere trivialities.

For I am the seasoned (tasty!), accomplished (more on the accomplishments later) warrior back from battle in far-away-lands. And by battle I mean, sword fighting. With swords.

So while my brothers toil on re-tiling our laundry room, I am sitting back and healing from the mental and physical afflictions that now accost me.

For example, I am still recovering from the two severe scrapes I received by diving for a volleyball a couple of weekends ago.

But then on a more serious note, I am forgetting and remembering this year, so that hopefully I can approach this coming one with a little more wisdom, a little less tentativeness and a lot more sandwiches.

Year 1 - Nearly Complete

I have 14 days left of class.
I have 19 calendar days until I am flying to Grand Rapids.

It is so close. And yet I cannot seem to find an accurate description or summary or whatever to neatly wrap this up.

Maybe this can't be wrapped up neatly. Well, probably.

But still.

One thing I can say; after the TAKS test, the pressure is definitely off. There is much less urgency everywhere. This is sad, but on the other hand, everyone is tired. I can see it. Shoot, I can feel it.

I for one, have been leaving at 4 pm almost every day. It is a revelation. Mr. F relates it to being in college - it's like we finished class and we don't have any homework until next week, so everyone is looking for something to do.

To occupy this new-found free-time I have been playing very hard.

I found a new game, Settlers of Catan, which many people have recommended over the past couple years. It is awesome.

I also play basketball, and go climbing 2 or 3 times a week.

I'm watching the Wire season 3.

I am cooking a lot.

Good things. I'm ready for Michigan.

Bobby

Last night I watched the movie by Emilio Estevez (Emeeeeeeeeeeeelioooooooo!) "Bobby". It is about the days leading up to the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy.

It is important to note that this movie is *not* about John F. Kennedy. Nope, this is about his little brother.

So I didn't really know anything about lil' bro until I watched this movie, but I must say, he is a captivating personality. My friend F told me that while the Republicans point to Reagan as the ultimate representation of the conservative mindset in action, Robert was the embodiment of the Democratic or liberal persuasion.

The movie was really well done, in my opinion. It was somewhat in the vein of Crash, with seemingly unrelated parallel story lines all converging (I know parallel lines can't converge) in the final scene.

While the movie was well done, or maybe because, it really messed me up. I don't know what it is about movies like this, where there is such a charismatic personality, or not even that positive - a personality that is empathetic but flawed, who is trying to do good and is stopped by palpable forces of hatred, but I just get all worked up.

It was the same thing with American History X. I see this hate, this hate that we (I am extrapolating here) can put in the back of our minds or let our eyes hop over in real life, and the hate like slaps me in the face and then goes on to kill all of the good and noble and beautiful things in the movie. Like when that kid got his brains blown across the bathroom wall in AHX. I mean what was that for anyway? What did that accomplish? It was over nothing, proved nothing, and the kid had made this huge turn and had so much potential.

That is what I saw and heard in Bobby. I saw this man, who in 1968, embodied so much that was good and right and beautiful about the civil rights movement, and yet had the backing of the powerful (whites). He had reconciliation on the mind in a way that strikes me as more progressive than many that are on the front lines of civil rights today.

It made me so angry that he was killed.

It made me so angry that we are still fighting the same kind of hate and division that existed in 1968.

I really liked Lawrence Fishburne's line in the movie though. He is talking about these two Mexican immigrants, one who is riddled with hate, who bemoans the unfair treatment, and says "No one is going to look at you and say I want some of what he's got" and then the other who is humble and good natured but yearns for fullness, saying, "You sir are a King. King Arthur was not always a king. But he had nobility. You sir are the Once and future king."

Who will I be?

Who will you be?

Who will we be?

TAKS Week

I am all in favor of accountability through testing. It is a good thing.

Students should be held accountable for the materials they are expected to learn in a grade, and if they fail to meet those expectations, they ought to be retained and *supported* so that on the second go-around they *are* successful. Of course, this comes with the caveat that the education system should be equipping every single student to have the choice of attending a 4-year university, and it that end goal, every decision (like, "You aren't ready for the 9th grade because you failed 8th grade math, and we want you to go to college, so you need to know this before you go on") should be made.

And not only students should be held accountable. The schools themselves ought to be held accountable for the product (education) that they are delivering, as well as the environment (safety, cultural exposure etc) they provide. So too should the teachers themselves be held accountable. If you are a disinterested, uncaring curmudgeon who is killing time, picking up a pay check, and terrorizing kids, you shouldn't be teaching.

Again, however, this accountability should come from a place of "We want our children to have the life options of attending a 4 year college, what do we need to offer to get them there?" Good teachers, good staff, and a good, safe environment are all important factors in this goal.

Just to re-emphasize, I think accountability/testing is good.

I think that NCLB (No Child Left Behind) and our state "high stakes" TAKS tests are stupid. I just survived a week of testing.

I do not know quite yet what would be a solution, but I know that the system we have now is broken and sucks. Just ask my students. Just ask teachers at my school.

To document, these are the things I did during the 6 hours that I was not allowed to do anything except "Actively Monitor" my classroom on both Tuesday and Wednesday. Oh yea, I was trained on what that meant.

1. Read Philippians 1
2. Read Philippians 2
3. Read Philippians 1 over and over
4. Read Philippians 2 over and over
5. Walked around the room
6. Walked around the room over and over
7. Took 15 second sit breaks at the back of the room where no one in the hallway could see me.
8. Took 15 second sit breaks over and over
9. Counted steps as I walked around the room
10. Counted steps over and over
11. Did a crossword (this was on the second day, when I got bold)
12. Folded paper cranes.
13. Planned the remaining weeks of school.
14. Thought about a project I am going to have my kids do
15. Thought about ice cream
16. Thought about ice cream over and over
17. Thought about injuring myself
18. Thought about injuring myself over and over
19. Prayed my students would do well.
20. Prayed my students would do well over and over.

P.S. I was lucky. Mr. F had to monitor on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.